


I've Been Here the Whole Time, Singing You a Song

by Howlingdawn



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Academy Era, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-04
Packaged: 2020-10-10 02:17:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20520314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Howlingdawn/pseuds/Howlingdawn
Summary: Nyota has sung to soothe Spock since she was eight years old. At first he tried not to care. Then they never really expected to meet. Then they never expected to break the rules to be together.Soulmate AU where you can feel their feelings and hear them singing. Inspired by Tumblr. Title from Carry You by Ruelle feat. Fleurie.





	I've Been Here the Whole Time, Singing You a Song

**Author's Note:**

> I found a prompt about being able to hear your soulmate singing on Tumblr not even 48 hours ago. I wrote the majority of this in a day. And I'm actually... super proud of it? I've always struggled to nail the more technical vocab of Vulcans but I actually think I did pretty well in this! I love the whole style of this, actually, and I have no idea where it came from. Point is, I'm super in love with this idea and super proud of how it turned it out, and I hope you guys feel the same!

Spock was eleven when he first heard her sing to him.

He had heard her sing before over the last five years. Those times were childish, giddy, full of laughter. Her voice changed as she grew older, but the joy she put into the words never once did the same. She sang for the fun of it – nothing more, nothing less.

Until today.

He was shut away in his bedroom, his knuckles still stinging from beating the older boy. His attempts to meditate, to control the anger and shame broiling within him, had long since been abandoned, and now he simply huddled on his bed, head in his hands. Even his mother's gentle words as she cleaned him up an hour ago had done little to soothe him.

But her voice caught his attention. Her usual joy and clumsy exuberance were gone this time, replaced by a heaviness, a wobble of pain that echoed within his human heart. Overtop of that, laced in with the ache, was a tenderness, a gentleness only his mother had ever shown Spock.

Today, his soulmate sang to soothe him.

"_Hush little darling, don't you cry. Nyota's gonna sing you a lullaby…"_

_Nyota._

At least he had a name now. A name to call the bundle of emotions he had for a soulmate. The soulmate who would always tie him to the human side he didn't want.

The door eased open. "Spock? It's almost time for dinner, sweetheart."

He dropped his hands, staring dully at his blanket. "She is singing to me."

His mother settled on the bed beside him – she alone knew he had a soulmate. Only Vulcans who genuinely fell in love with a non-Vulcan had one. If the others knew he would fall in love one day… No. That could not happen. Ever.

"To you?" his mother asked, smoothing his rumpled hair.

"An Earth lullaby. Her name is Nyota."

"That's a pretty name." She smiled. "Sounds like she's your guardian angel."

"I am Vulcan. I should not _need _a guardian angel. Nor a soulmate."

With that, he stood, rigidly straight, and went to wash up, firmly ignoring the girl's singing.

He did not miss his mother's pained look after him.

\-----

If, over the following ten years, Nyota ever recognized any of Spock's anger as being directed at her for being a constant reminder of the human half he wished to suppress, it never deterred her. When he was in pain, or scared, or even just nervous, she sang to him. Sometimes it was just quiet humming, as if she were trying to be subtle, and other times she truly sang, her voice lifted in whatever song she thought would cheer him up at the time.

Her voice had become angelic, evolving with the many hours of practice she put in as she grew into a young woman. Despite every attempt to avoid listening, Spock had come to enjoy her performances, admiring the technical perfection she eventually learned to achieve. If she should desire such a thing, she could certainly have a successful career in the music industry.

And thus, even as he tried to insist to himself and his mother that he did not reassurance, he found himself appreciating Nyota's soothing music as he faced the council members who would decide whether his future lay in the Vulcan Science Academy or Starfleet.

"It is truly remarkable, Spock, that you have achieved so much, despite your disadvantage."

His spike of anger made Nyota falter, but she continued her singing.

"If you would clarify, Minister," Spock asked, already knowing the answer, "to what disadvantage are you referring?"

"Your human mother."

Nyota's singing grew louder, not because she altered her volume, but because, for the first time, Spock consciously and without hesitation dropped every mental barrier he had erected to block her out.

He knew she was human – simple research had informed him that "Nyota" was from an Earth language called Swahili. Which meant that, in Spock's twenty-one years of life, the only two people to ever show him true kindness were both human. His future, he suddenly saw with crystal clarity, had never been on Vulcan.

_If they insist upon seeing me as human, then human I shall be._

Ignoring his father's warning stare, Spock delivered the necessary pleasantries in as scathing a tone as he dared before swiftly marching to his future.

\-----

Starfleet Academy, however, proved no simpler an existence than Vulcan.

He wasn't entirely certain what he had expected. He had visited Earth before, both on business trips and family vacations, but somehow, he hadn't quite expected how cold it would be, in terms of both temperature and companionship. While the Vulcans had ostracized him for being too human, the humans found him too Vulcan to understand, and their wildly varying emotions confused him. His mother had always kept as much discipline as she could so as not to reflect badly upon her husband and son, and being on a planet full of beings who had no such reserve without her guidance was overwhelming.

While his mother called and messaged as often as she could, Spock found that the only true constant he had left was Nyota. Even though she must be busy with school and discovering her own path into adult life, she still sang to him whenever he was distressed, without fail. She soothed him when he was at his loneliest, his most confused, his most afraid that he had made the wrong choice in one impulsive, emotional moment.

His mother tried her best to overcome the distance between them. Captain Pike took Spock under his wing, the only one who seemed to realize how much Spock was truly floundering on this alien world, and that mentorship brought its own comfort, in the limited way Pike and Spock felt able to embrace it. But Nyota's voice alone never changed, never wavered, never failed to come when he needed her steadiness.

While he wanted to say he would have found a way to forge ahead on his own, Spock knew there was a very real possibility he would have dropped out without her constant presence.

\-----

Despite the distance, his mother was the first person to realize Spock was falling in love with Nyota. She cited a mother's intuition, but Spock knew she had to have seen something in his human eyes, or heard something in his voice. They were always the first things to betray him when he tried to suppress particularly strong emotions.

Regardless of how she knew, once she brought it to light, he could not deny the truth in her words. He had learned a lot after listening to Nyota. She was dedicated to her craft – her failures to sing the lyrics accurately were met not with frustration, but steady determination to perform better the next time – and thus, he assumed, dedicated to her every endeavor. She enjoyed languages, singing in numerous ones over the years, her proficiency in each one growing rapidly with each rendition of the musical number.

When not singing to him, she was still joyous, but that joy had become rather reserved, by human standards, as she aged. He felt her emotions alongside his own, but even when he was swamped by the illogic of the humans at the Academy, hers made sense. Hers never overwhelmed him.

The combination of it all intrigued him – and comforted him. A human who was free to be such, but she still employed an almost Vulcan reservedness. Aside from his mother, Spock had never met a human like her. It not only bade well for their relationship, should they ever meet, but it made Spock _want _to meet her.

Still, he knew at the moment, he loved only the _idea _of her. Which was, perhaps, how he justified never singing to her in return. She was strong and confident on her own. She did not need to be awkwardly hummed to by a Vulcan she may never meet.

For all he knew, if she was even one who believed in marrying only her soulmate in the first place, when she realized her soulmate was a Vulcan, she would immediately turn her back on that belief and search instead for another human who was comfortable ignoring his own soulmate. Were he a human in her position, Spock thought he might have done the same. He still did not understand what had possessed his mother to choose a Vulcan family, knowing how she had struggled at certain times.

So he allowed himself to admit the truth in his mother's words, but he did not allow himself to act on them.

\-----

Learning multiple languages was logical for an individual who wished to travel space in a multi-species organization. However, Nyota's clear love of them must have, to coin a human phrase, rubbed off on Spock. He found himself picking up languages as his electives more and more, from Andorian and Klingon to Latin and Ancient Greek. Thus, when he graduated and was required to take up a teaching position whilst they finished construction of the _Enterprise_, filling the recently vacated advanced phonology position was logical.

What he did not expect, as he glanced through the list of his students for the fall 2256 semester, was to see a young woman named Nyota Uhura on his PADD.

He blinked at the name. Without thinking, he opened her file.

_Uhura, Nyota. Born January 19, 2233, in Kitui, Kenya, United States of Africa, Earth. Xenolinguistics major._

It certainly fit. Her name and the majority of her earliest singing were Swahili, and he had begun sensing emotions that were not his own when he was three years old. Her love of language would suggest a focus on xenolinguistics, and indeed, her first name even meant "star" in her native tongue – perhaps it was not so surprising she would seek a career in Starfleet.

Could finding his soulmate truly be as simple as having her walk into his classroom?

The odds were stacked against such a meeting, but a simple test would prove his hypothesis.

On the first day of class, he projected an ancient Vulcan poem onto the board. This exercise was not technically necessary for the course, but he could pass it off as assessing the students' existing abilities. "Cadet Uhura," he said at precisely the moment class started, silencing any lingering conversation from the other students, "please translate each line of this poem in a different language."

She straightened to attention, intelligent eyes skimming the poem for a brief moment before she began to speak. She chose Klingon, Tellaran, Cardassian, Andorian, the rarest of the three Romulan dialects, and finally English.

Spock knew after one Klingon word that it was her.

_My soulmate… is my student. And my junior officer._

He was suddenly glad he had never sung to her in return. No doubt she would recognize his voice just as easily, and they would both be facing a soulmate who required them to break regulations to be with. As a Vulcan, he could not stand such a thing; as a cadet, she could not risk it.

"Commander? Were my translations correct?"

He abruptly realized she had finished several moments ago. Giving himself a mental shake, he nodded. "Yes, Cadet, your translations were perfect." He brought up a new poem, this one in French. "Cadet Burns, translate this poem."

As the young man began his own translation, Spock was aware of Nyota's attention remaining on him. Her eyes were narrowed ever so slightly, studying him, and he avoided looking back at her.

It was no longer his decision not to act on what he knew. And until one or both of them left Starfleet or achieved equal rank, it would not be his again.

\-----

That night, Nyota found she could not focus on the homework Commander Spock had assigned. It was challenging in a fun, intriguing way, but her thoughts kept slipping back to the look he had given her, the way he had lingered, the way she could have _sworn _she saw some sort of emotion in them, buried incredibly deep but there nonetheless.

"Gaila," she said, "what do you know about Commander Spock?"

Her roommate looked up from the temporal mechanics notes scattered across her bed, concentration giving way to surprise. "You want me to tell you about gossip?"

Nyota pursed her lips. "I wouldn't phrase it that way."

"No, no you wouldn't. What do you want to know?"

She shrugged. "Anything, I guess."

Gaila dropped her stylus and leaned back, crossing her arms as she thought. "Well, he's half human, so some people swear they can see him getting annoyed sometimes. Others say those people are nuts, because he's just as annoyingly logical as every other Vulcan ever."

"And yet he came here," Nyota murmured. Most Vulcans with an interest in a scientific career remained with the Vulcan Science Academy, and yet Spock had decided to forge a path among humans. It was an odd decision for a man raised on a planet entrenched in tradition and logic.

"They say both he and other Vulcans seem even colder than usual when they have to talk," Gaila went on. "Some even say they've seen Spock deliberately change course in the middle of the hallway to avoid other Vulcans. And his mother has visited him, but never his Vulcan father."

_He dislikes other Vulcans, and the feeling is mutual._

She drew her knees to her chest, wrapping her arms around and resting her chin on them. Between the constant anger, pain, and despair, Nyota had long suspected her soulmate suffered some sort of bullying. It had never occurred to her that her soulmate could be Vulcan, but Spock was half human, and given how Vulcans looked down on most humans… no wonder she had always felt him struggling to suppress his every feeling.

"Has he ever seemed distracted before?" she asked.

Gaila furrowed her brows. "No. Most people complain that he'll discipline students over so much as one stray whisper. Why?"

_Because I distracted him simply by speaking._

He would know her first name was Nyota. He would have been able to guess when and where she was born, and a glance at her file would confirm his thoughts. And he would certainly be able to recognize her voice.

He would know her, but he had said nothing.

She shook her head. "Nothing. Go back to your homework."

Gaila leaned closer to her. "Ny, is something wrong?"

_My soulmate is my teacher, my superior, and a Vulcan. I wondered if joining Starfleet would lead me to him one day, but… he'll never break the rules like that. Even if I do know he likes me._

Nyota sighed and returned her attention to her homework. "Nothing that matters, Gaila. Nothing that can be fixed."

\-----

It didn't stop her from finding ways to spend time with him, and he certainly didn't try to stop her. He asked for a teaching assistant and she promptly volunteered. They spent hours in companionable silence together as they graded his students' work, interspersed by quality conversations in a variety of languages about topics ranging from him helping with her studies to deep philosophy. Those conversations never really included anything personal from either party, but still, Nyota found she was able to get to know him.

He was rather sweet, by Vulcan standards. He always encouraged and helped her when she needed it, and even seemed proud of her when she didn't need help. He had a taste for romantic poetry and stories about found family, although he either pretended he didn't or tried to brush it off as purely academic in nature if she brought it up. That part was more bittersweet than sweet, given what she had surmised about his past, but it… humanized him, for lack of a better word. There was even a line she had found where she could tease him – just a touch and not often, but his confusion when he noticed was quite cute, and he never seemed to resent it or want her to stop. He was also quite adept at sarcasm, though he pretended he didn't do that either.

On that note, she had learned to read him. A flicker of his eyes, a tilt of his head, a shift of one slanted eyebrow. They spoke volumes, and with them, she could tell when he was proud, frustrated, or even bored. That last one was rare, though she had noticed it once or twice during group projects when he had little to do but supervise them. She searched for those same tells in the Vulcans that visited the Academy, but they were either too subtle for her to notice, or Spock was unique among his people in having them.

All told, it wasn't long before she realized she had fallen in love. Part of her had always been skeptical about the man she loved being chosen for her since birth, but it seemed that whatever forces decided on a pairing knew what they were doing. She liked that he didn't push into her personal space or business, though she wasn't quite sure how that would translate into an actual relationship.

Not that that could ever happen. She took her feelings and stowed them away with a discipline she thought he would appreciate, and continued to enjoy their professional dialogue for as long as it may last.

\-----

"I found her," Spock said on one of his mother's visits to Earth.

Mother looked up from her meal in surprise. "As in _her _her?"

Spock glanced around the restaurant, yet another check for Vulcans. Finding none, he said "Yes."

She grinned. "Tell me about her!"

He brushed his fork idly through his salad. "She is incredibly intelligent. We were right: She enjoys language. I have never heard someone so fluent in so many."

"High praise," his mother said with a slight teasing edge.

Spock wasn't quite quick enough to suppress a smile before it made the corners of his mouth twitch upwards. "She teases me as well."

Mother leaned back, eyes widening in surprise. "Are you comfortable with that?"

"Surprisingly… yes," he admitted. "She does not seem malicious about it, nor does she ever take it very far at all."

"It seems this woman is perfect for you."

He glanced up at her. "She is my student."

"Oh." His mother leaned forward, resting her weight on her elbows, taking a contemplative bite of her spaghetti. "She won't be once the semester is over, though, will she?"

"No," Spock allowed. "But I am a commander. She will be my junior officer."

"Let me tell you something, sweetheart," Mother said, setting her fork down and folding her hands together. "Some of the best relationships start as secrets."

"That is highly illogical, Mother."

"And yet, it's true," she said. "Your father and I kept our relationship a secret for a while. We didn't really know where it was going or if it would work out, soulmates or not. And that's when you have the time to really _learn _about each other. No pressures from friends, no expectation of things lasting… You can figure things out about yourselves and your relationship in peace and at your own pace, which is especially helpful when one half of the relationship is Vulcan."

Spock furrowed his brows, tilting his head. "You are suggesting I break the rules for love?"

"I am indeed," she confirmed. "Some things are worth breaking a rule or two, sweetie. Particularly matters of the heart."

Spock made a noncommittal little noise and returned to his meal, mulling over her words.

\-----

Something had shifted in Spock.

It was subtle, but it was unmistakably there. As the semester's close drew nearer with each passing day, he seemed to grow ever so slightly bolder. He sat perhaps half an inch closer to her during their time alone, and even volunteered a slightly personal topic or two every now and then. Nyota had never expected such tiny gestures to seem romantically daring, and yet that was undeniably how he was making her feel.

But somehow, he simultaneously seemed more awkward. He had stumbled over his words a time or two, occasionally looking like he was about to say something before his shoulders slumped slightly and he took a moment before saying something else. As much as he tried to suppress it, she could feel the battle within him, the battle between rules and romance and awkwardness.

It only made her want to kiss him. To take his hand into hers and tell him it was ok, that she would break the rules for him or wait for him to be ready, whatever he wanted.

Yet something held her back too. The ever-present thought that dating a teacher or superior officer could easily cast into doubt every achievement she made, no matter how much she did to earn them. She wanted to admit her feelings, but that somehow seemed so… final. As if saying it would change their lives forever, and not necessarily for the better.

So she remained silent.

And in the moment the console exploded beside her, she regretted it.

\-----

Spock was overseeing a run of his _Kobayashi Maru _simulation when the power overloaded.

As he rushed to try and distribute the power to stop the overload from his station in the viewing room, it took the cadets inside a moment too long to realize it wasn't part of the scenario. The cadet acting as captain – a young man named James Kirk – rushed to help his fellow students, and Nyota was right beside him. One cadet, a Russian boy who, at fifteen, was one of the Academy's youngest cadets, tripped trying to flee his station, and she hurried to help him to his feet.

Which put her in the blast radius when Spock failed and the console exploded.

He grabbed a fire extinguisher and hurried inside, spraying away the very real flames. If, in the ensuing chaos, anyone noticed that he made a beeline for Nyota, he did not care. She had fallen facedown, and he rolled her over with the utmost care, cradling her head to still it. He found her pulse, and could not control the way he drooped with relief upon finding it strong and steady. The cadet she had been helping was already waking beside them.

"Move, I'm a doctor," a cadet said in a thick southern accent, very nearly shoving Spock aside to reach Nyota.

Realizing that other doctors and engineers were beginning to fill the room, Spock knew there was nothing more he could do. Grabbing a PADD and making an excuse about reviewing the data on his own, he all but fled to the sanctuary of his quarters.

Once there, he found himself unable to do anything but collapse on his bed. The adrenaline surge was wearing off, leaving his hands shaking. He pressed them together in a meditation pose and curled up, touching the tips of his extended pointer fingers to his forehead as he took deep, steadying breaths.

Emotions roiled within him, both his and hers. She had had a split second to feel between the explosion and unconsciousness, and feel she had. Her incredible spike of terror combined with his longer-lasting anxiety over her wellbeing. Beneath that lay his guilt at being unable to prevent the overload, and…

And her regret.

His eyes snapped open to the darkened room as her regret awoke his own. Regret at wasting their time together, at being unable to conquer his human nerves and Vulcan need to follow regulations.

_The semester ends tomorrow._

Nyota had passed her final exam with flying colors – she would graduate his class. And then… he would no longer be her teacher. That didn't mean they were free, but… it was a start.

Suddenly finding a strength he had lacked these last few weeks – no, his entire _life _– he picked up his seldom-used personal PADD and took it into the bathroom. Pulling up a playlist he had assembled over the years of songs his mother loved, he pressed play and stepped into the shower, where the acoustics were best.

As he let the water wash away the grime, he hesitantly began to sing.

\-----

_Is that… classic rock?_

It was the first thing Nyota heard upon waking: A voice stumbling over aggressively paced words, nearly devoid of emotion while trying to match a tone and speed that were clearly supposed to be full of passionate energy. It was _supposed _to be singing, but this… was not a song Vulcans were meant to sing. She would've laughed, had she not realized one very important thing:

This was the first time Spock had ever sung. And it was _to her_. When she was injured.

_Oh my God. I- I got injured in front of him. Did the power overload in the viewing room too? Is he ok?_

She tried to bolt upright, only for pain to burst across her upper back.

"Easy, Cadet, easy," a southern accent soothed. Gentle hands gripped her by her upper arms, steadying her without aggravating her injuries. "You took a beating, but you'll be fine. Can you tell me your name?"

"Nyota Uhura," she said, sinking carefully back onto the biobed. "Was anyone else hurt?"

"Just some bumps and bruises. The kid you shielded told me to thank you for him."

"Any time," she said, forcing her eyes open to look around the medical ward. A young woman lay sleeping on a biobed across the room, but she hadn't been at the simulation, and otherwise they were alone. "Was anyone in the viewing room hurt?"

The doctor, whom she now recognized as the only person who ever hung out with Jim Kirk, was up and checking her vitals on the board above her head. "No. I think it was just the one console that blew."

"That's good," she said, letting out a sigh of relief. She cast a glance over him. "Weren't you caught in that blast? Should you be working?"

"Technically, no." McCoy cast his own look around the ward. "We were all given the rest of the day off. I just happened to be getting something I forgot when you started waking up."

"Ah. Well, thank you."

"I could never ignore a patient." He typed in one last thing before looking at her. "I'll tell the doc you're up. If you don't try to jump out of bed again, you should be out of here in the morning."

"Believe me, I have no intention of trying that again."

_The sooner I get out of here, the sooner I can see Spock._

"Damn, a patient who listens to me. That's rare."

She laughed, rolling onto her side to take her weight off her back. "If it weren't the end of the semester, you wouldn't be saying that."

"Typical," McCoy sighed. "Get some rest, Uhura."

"I will."

He walked off, and she closed her eyes.

For a few hours, she let her world consist only of Spock's adorable, awkward singing.

\-----

The cadets celebrated the end of each semester with a party. Thus, at the end of each semester, Spock took the time when everyone else was occupied socializing to utilize the empty library, enjoying the feel of the antique paper books no one was permitted to remove from the building. He could even get away with turning up the temperature to suit his Vulcan comfort levels. Tonight, however, was destined to be different.

After feeling a spike of nervousness that was not his own, he heard footsteps approaching him. "Hello, Commander Spock."

He looked up, knowing before she spoke who it was. "Cadet Uhura," he greeted. She held herself carefully, but did not look unwell otherwise. "How are your injuries?"

"Healing quickly," she answered. "I'll be sore for a while, but I'll live."

"That is good."

They fell silent, unsure of how to proceed. Spock leaned forward, closing and setting his book down with deliberate slowness, avoiding look at her. He could feel what she wanted, and undoubtedly she felt the same from him, but neither seemed quite able to pluck up the courage to admit it aloud. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, not hearing or seeing her do the exact same thing at the exact same time.

"Would you like to go for a walk?" they asked simultaneously.

Their eyes flew open and he looked up at her. "I guess that's a yes," she said, laughing a little.

Spock's nerves eased a little at the sound. Her laugh was so musical that it should have counted as part of their bond, but alas, he had not heard it until the first time she laughed in his classroom. "I suppose so."

He rose, and they fell into step beside each other, not quite looking at each other.

The night was cool, the stars shining overhead. The grass crunched beneath their feet, and they did not speak again until they reached a more isolated section of the campus's gardens, the pleasant aroma of the flowers drifting around them.

_Some of the best relationships start as secrets._

He dared to glance over at her. She was certainly beautiful, he reflected, her rich skin almost glowing in the starlight, a tiny smile playing across her lips as she looked at the flowers flourishing by their feet. And he knew from the past months that the mind and personality beneath were equally beautiful, if not more so. After the years of bullying, after yesterday's accident… her presence was comforting.

_My guardian angel._

Where he had once despised the thought of having a soulmate, he now never wanted to be without her.

He just had to figure out how to tell her.

"I…" He paused, giving in to the very human urge to swallow before trying again. "I believe you have already come to this conclusion as well, but I feel the need to say it: I believe we are soulmates."

She looked up at him, her smile at the flowers turning into the warm, teasing smile he had come to know and even look forward to seeing. "You feel the need to say it, hm?"

He pursed his lips. "A simple vernacular term."

"If I were your soulmate," she pointed out lightly, "wouldn't I know better?"

"I… suppose you would."

Her gaze drifted to his pointed ears. "I must say, all those years I sang to you… I never expected you were Vulcan. I didn't really think you guys had soulmates."

"Most do not. It is only Vulcans destined to genuinely love non-Vulcans that do."

"That's logical."

"Indeed."

She stopped on an arched wooden bridge, a creek meandering along beneath them, and turned to him, her playful smile gone. "We both know the risks of this, and we both know how we feel. But I would never ask you to do something you're not comfortable with. We need this talk, but if you want it to end here, I'll let it. No muss, no fuss."

"I am not comfortable with this," he admitted. "But after nearly losing you yesterday… nor do I want it to end here."

"And what does that mean for us?" she asked, her tone neutral, not pushing for an answer.

"It means…" He searched for the words to express himself without offending her. "It means I am Vulcan. Humans confuse me, and I do not even remotely know how to build a friendship with one, let alone a romantic relationship. But I know that I want to try. With you."

Her smile returned, slowly, hesitantly, reflecting the budding excitement within her. "I know just as little about making a relationship work with a Vulcan, but I'm willing to try too."

It was illogical – he knew how she felt – but he had to check. "You do not care that I am Vulcan?"

"All that makes me care about is respecting your culture," she said gently. "And that it means you have really cute ears."

Spock worked quickly to suppress a smile, but he could do nothing about the blush creeping into his cheeks. Her smile only grew at the sight, and that certainly did not help.

"Vulcans, um…" She held up the first two fingers of her right hand. "This is how Vulcan couples kiss, isn't it?"

"It is," he said. "However… my parents did kiss occasionally."

She stepped closer, closing the distance between them, until she was close enough that he could've sworn he felt her heart picking up speed to beat in time with his. "Bringing up your parents – how romantic."

"I only meant-"

"I know," she whispered, rising to her tiptoes. Her hand went to his waist, the other rising to cup the back of his head, and her warmth was irresistible. He let her guide him down to her, resting his hands hesitantly on her waist, drawing her close to him. "Tell me if I'm going too fast for you," she said, her breath tickling his lips.

"You are not," he assured her, just as quiet, the subtle scent of her perfume all around him.

Her eyes drifted shut, and he did the same, surrendering entirely to his human half.

Beneath the stars, their lips finally met, the touch soft and tender.

Sparks did not fly from the contact, but the first time, Spock's soul felt… whole.

Judging by the way Nyota smiled into the kiss, she felt the same.

_Perhaps this _is_ worth breaking the rules for._

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, as of this fic I now headcanon that Amanda loved the same music Jim and Jaylah do, and imagining that music in a Vulcan household is. An Image.


End file.
